Frequently Asked Questions - Shipping

When you order a truckload of fertilizer, or even if you just want to know how much a load of a particular fertilizer might cost you delivered, we have to decide the best way to get it to you.

If it is a bulk dry fertilizer, we can haul it in bulk hopper bottom (aka belly dump) trailers at about 25 ton per truckload, this is the best & most economical way to haul bulk. However, if you want the product dumped in a nice neat pile, you would be better served by requesting an end-dump trailer. They cost a little more & deliver a little less (22-23 ton/load) but you will have the pile where you need it. Also some powder fertilizers, such as the Idaho soft rock phosphate are better delivered in an end-dump trailer as it tends to pack & become difficult to unload in a hopper-bottom or belly-dump trailer.

Liquid fertilizers are delivered in tanker trucks and some are even available in totes with capacities ranging from 220 to 275 gallons per tote depending on the product.

Certain dry products that are water soluble are better transported in dry vans to keep them from getting wet. That said, at certain times of the year dry vans are hard to come by. A typical dry van will carry 21-22 ton of product.

Depending on the time of year the region, we can also move these products fairly safely in a well-tarped flatbed trailer. The advantage to this is that a flatbed can easily haul a bigger payload, getting you 23-24 ton of product at sometimes a better cost/ton ratio than the dry van.

One factor that can affect the cost of shipping that you have some control over is timing. If you wait til the last minute to order your fertilizers for the Fall or Spring, you can be sure there are a lot of others trying to do the same.

This is great news for the freight companies as according to the law of supply and demand, the cost of freight just goes up. That is why some of our suppliers offer their products at lower prices in the off season.

Did you know you can usually order gypsum or lime at $4-6/ton and sometimes even $10/ton less in the summer & winter months versus trying to order it in the busy Spring & Fall season? And during those slow summer months, freight prices seem more reasonable and there are fewer delays due to lack of trucks.